David Stern: NBA began testing for marijuana after players complained of others playing high

The NBA began testing for marijuana in 1999 under then-commissioner David Stern.

But as current commissioner Adam Silver endorses the status quo, Stern is talking of changing the league’s marijuana policy.

Stern in an interview with Al Harrington for Uninterrupted:

It was sort of generally known at some point until we tightened the rules that a lot of our players were smoking a lot of marijuana. In fact, some of our players came to us and said some of these guys are high coming into the game. But we began tightening it up, and at that time, people accepted the generally held wisdom that marijuana was a gateway drug and that if you start smoking, you’re liable to go on to bigger and better stuff.

I think we’ve got to change the collective bargaining agreement and let you do what is legal in your state. If marijuana is now in the process of being legalized, I would think you should be allowed to do what’s legal in your state.

I’m now at the point where, personally, I think it probably should be removed from the banned list.

Stern is correct that marijuana should be removed from the banned-substances list. It’s becoming increasingly legal, and the NBA shouldn’t police a substance that is neither legal nor performance-enhancing. As public opinion rapidly turns toward legalization, the NBA isn’t even incentivized to appease the portion of the fan base so troubled by marijuana use.

That’s who Stern and the owners he worked for were trying to accommodate in 1999 – not players who complained of other players getting high before games. That claim is disingenuous.

But the testing helped create a desirable perception. It didn’t matter how many players were hurt financially by marijuana suspensions or steered into addictive painkillers if they resisted marijuana. Stern’s NBA could present a “clean” image.

My jaw dropped when I saw that he had said that. David Stern, of all people. But you know, it wouldn't surprise me a bit if he did Silver and the other commissioners a favor by floating this as a trial balloon to see how everyone reacts.

why is the NBA that is always complaining about not being able to use marijuana? You hear the complaints to a much smaller degree in the NFL....even less in MLB....and then I have never heard it in other sports like NHL, PGA, etc......but the NBA is always complaining about not being able to smoke weed._________________"To arrive at a contradiction is to confess an error in one's thinking; to maintain a contradiction is to abdicate one's mind and to evict oneself from the realm of reality." Ayn Rand